Cold hands, warm heart
by bitterfloof
Summary: Church shoved his other hand into his pocket and tried to bury part of his face into his scarf to hide just how red he had gone. He wanted to keep that much to himself. Not that it mattered really, Caboose had gone back to talking as it began snowing lightly again. Sparing a glance towards Caboose, Church could see the way his blue eyes sparkled in the fading light. [Churboose, AU]


**NOTE: CROSSPOSTED ON AO3**

* * *

If there was one thing Church couldn't stand - it was snow. It was cold and wet and could freeze over into ice. It slowed everything down or caused it to come to a standstill. Snow was generally the worst. If he could admire it from behind the windows of his house, where it was nice and warm, that was fine. Being out in it however . . . Fuck no.

Which was precisely the problem.

Church had agreed to spend the day with Caboose (who incidentally loved snow) but that had been before the sudden onslaught of snow and despite how much Church wanted to text Caboose and cancel everything - because fucking snow - he also couldn't do that.

Caboose was like an excitable puppy with the attention span to match and, in all honesty, Church thought it was kind of adorable. Except, he would never outright say that. There was still an ongoing debate whether they were actually dating because of Church's, well, standoffish attitude. It wasn't his fault he was awkward with emotions!

So, he sucked it up and dealt with the snow. Besides if he wrapped up warm enough then maybe he wouldn't notice how cold it was.

Except, one issue, he couldn't find his gloves. Warm winter gloves weren't exactly in Church's everyday clothing supplies, if it was cold he'd avoid it like the plague - but he still owned a pair of gloves. Or he thought he did. The last time he checked, admittedly at least a year ago, he had a pair of black gloves tucked into the back of his sock drawer - which were now missing apparently.

"Just fucking great," Church muttered shifting the drawer contents about without much luck. The gloves had either vanished into thin air or somebody had taken then and not put them back (probably Tex, she had a bad habit of doing that).

Slamming the drawer shut, Church resigned himself to a fate of cold hands since he didn't have time to search the whole place for another pair of gloves - well that was just fantastic.

* * *

Church knew he was late when he came speed walking around the corner to where he and Caboose were meant to be meeting. It had stopped snowing for the time being and Church couldn't help but be a little thankful, walking in snow slowed him down already; having to walk when it was snowing was just a pain.

Caboose was standing and began to wave when he noticed Church. He was wrapped from head to toe looking way warmer than Church felt. There was an odd childishness about Caboose, maybe it came from the fact he was wearing ear muffs . . . Yeah, maybe. Still suited him - which was really weird.

"Hello Church!" Caboose Greeted him excitedly. "There's snow now! We can make snowmen and have snowball fights and make snow angels and oh my god this is going to be so cool!"

"Hey," Church greeted trying to keep the chatter out if his voice, why was he the one cursed to get cold at the drop of a hat?

Caboose's hug was warm, and Church could feel the way he lived basically as a human radiator and it kind of made the shorter male not to want let go, simply so he didn't get cold again - but he had to let go eventually (unfortunately). Caboose was lucky, he always seemed to run a little warm - it matched his sunny personality.

Somehow Caboose had convinced Church to go make a snowman (because that's apparently what you do in the snow . . . kay) but with each passing moment, Church was regretting it.

At least Caboose was enjoying himself.

They were at the bottom of a large hill which had multiple kids and teenagers flinging themselves down on the brightly coloured plastic sledges, wiping out whenever they went over a bump on the hill. Watching them roll down in the cold was much funnier to watch than getting his hands cold building the snowman.

Not that he would ever say that.

Caboose was just putting the final touches to the snowman (it was kind of cute in a snowman way, small, a little lopsided with funny stick arms and a drawn on face) when out of nowhere the ground disappeared from beneath Church's feet and he ended up flat on his back as one of the sledgers that Church had been watching earlier came barrelling down the hill.

"Son of a bitch," Church could have murdered the child who looked scared as they picked themselves up and ran back to join their friends. "Fucking hate kids."

Church, however, wasn't the only casualty. The poor snowman had taken a hit too and was lying splattered back into the snow, stubby body destroyed, and stick arms crushed. Yet Caboose was laughing.

"It's okay. We will just have to make another one!" Caboose announced smiling widely.

It didn't take long to rebuild Stasney (as Church nicknamed it) but after a while, he was beginning to feel it in his hands because fuck, his hands were freezing. Church was desperately trying to listen to whatever Caboose was saying and it would be much easier if he wasn't hyper aware of just how numb his fingers were becoming.

He had kind of hoped just keeping his hands in his pockets would be enough as Caboose put the finishing touches to his redone snowman - but nope, the cold was sinking through his jacket too (probably thanks to the stupid sledging takedown)

God, he hated snowy/cold weather. It could take a flying fuck to itself.

Caboose stopped talking, looking down at Church who clearly wasn't paying attention. His hat was pulled low over his face, but it was obvious he wasn't very comfortable. He could see the way Church's hands were jammed into his pockets and there were only two reasons why that was: 1) because he was annoyed and close to punching somebody or 2) he was uncomfortable but wanted to hide it.

It could be either one of the two.

However, given the weather and how his face wasn't that angry way it got (slightly scrunched eyebrows and eyes mostly fixed on the floor in an attempt to make it less obvious he was glaring) Caboose was safe to assume that Church was uncomfortable.

Church was shivering, not a lot but enough that it was obvious if you were looking for it and since Caboose always stood as close to Church as he would allow, it was pretty damn noticeable. It made perfect sense that Church was probably cold.

In a split moment, Caboose grabbed a hold of Church's hand. Even through his gloves he could feel the way the cold sunk through. Church, whose face was going very quickly red, stared up at Caboose.

"Your hands are so cold," Caboose smiled, squeezing Church's hand gently.

"Um . . . Yeah," fuck, abort, abort. How could one person be so cute! Caboose's stupid smile and (really) nice eyes were the exact reason why Church wasn't exactly overt with his feelings - he turned into a stupid mess whenever his boyfriend did anything remotely adorable; which was a surprisingly large amount of things.

Church shoved his other hand into his pocket and tried to bury part of his face into his scarf to hide just how red he had gone. He wanted to keep that much to himself. Not that it mattered really, Caboose had gone back to talking as it began snowing lightly again. Sparing a glance towards Caboose, Church could see the way his blue eyes sparkled in the fading light.

He watched some of the snow flutter down onto Caboose's outstretched and, he was smiling, looking up at the sky and Church couldn't help the way his heart ached at just how fucking adorable his boyfriend truly was. But even that wasn't enough to keep the way cold and he couldn't help the way he shivered.

"It's getting dark . . . and I'm really fucking cold," Church muttered that last part. "Do you maybe want to start heading off."

"Okay."

Caboose gave Stasney a pat on its cold head and the pair began to walk back towards Caboose's house as the snow began to fall heavier around them. The pair were making their way back towards Caboose's house when the blonde stopped suddenly, pulling off one of his gloves and gestured towards Church.

"You don't have to."

"I want to."

Caboose shot Church another one of his sunny smiles that made his heart hurt ever so slightly. No wonder Tucker liked to tease him about being lovestruck whenever he actually got talking about Caboose - he probably fucking was and with good reason!

"Fine."

"Now you can be not-cold with me."

It was a little strange that they were each only wearing one glove but since Caboose had been previously wearing the piece of clothing it was still warm when Church slipped it on, keeping his other hand in his pocket to try and stay as warm as possible, so it wasn't all that bad.

"Did you have fun today?" Caboose asked cheerily.

"Yeah, it was okay," Church replied, he knew Caboose would know what he actually meant.

* * *

Church was eternally thankful for how cosy the back room in Caboose's family home was. It had big glass doors leading out onto the untouched snowy back garden that were framed by white curtains, the falling snow created patterns across the plush cream carpet where Caboose and Church were sitting. They had changed out of their damp, snow covered clothing into something more comfortable. Caboose was sitting behind Church; a large dark blue fluffy blanket was pulled around them as they sat close to the fireplace. It wasn't a real fire but the heat coming from it was heavenly compared to being outside and Church kept scooting closer to it until Caboose came up wrapped his arms around Church's waist.

"You're going to fall in."

Church knew that it was ridiculous he would fall into fire but appreciate Caboose's sentiment to keeping him safe. Church was much happier inside, cuddled up and warm. Sure, going out and building snowmen was kinda fun (getting run over by a sledge was less so) but staying indoors and watching the snow was much more fun – especially if he could enjoy it with his boyfriend.

It didn't take long for either Church or Caboose in their comfortable warmth to fall asleep bathed in the glow of the fireplace. Yeah, snow days weren't all that bad.

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Thank you for reading**


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